Still can't watch the Twins - I can't let this go.

[tarheeltwinsfan]

On 5/28/2024 at 11:20 AM, Riverbrian said:

I know there are Twins fans in Iowa who don't feel sorry for me. Welcome to the club is what most are likely saying. However... I still can't watch my Twins and this is getting beyond ridiculous because it appears that it isn't ending any time soon. 

Reports are that the two sides are not even looking at each other in some sort of pointless stand still while all parties are attempting to solve this through the courts which should take forever and a day. 

MLB to my knowledge has asked the court to hasten the bankruptcy. 

Diamond recently asked the court for a 41 day extension. 

This really sucks!!! 

 

 

Can you just buy an MLB.com account?

 

On 5/28/2024 at 11:30 AM, bean5302 said:

I don't think you should let it go. Somebody at the top of the Twins needs to be terminated over this. Maybe the plug gets pulled on Joe Pohlad or maybe it's time for St. Peter to turn in his corner office.

The cluster#*@& fans have been handed by the front office and ownership this year has really damaged the organization's reputation. I'm very skeptical I'll have seasons again next year.

How do you propose to fire the owner?

 

On 5/28/2024 at 11:30 AM, bean5302 said:

I suggest you open your window and yell at the top of your lungs: "I'm mad as Hell and I'm not going to take it any more!"

 

[nicksaviking]

20 hours ago, Riverbrian said:

The last sentence of the article says it all. 

"Bankruptcy is bankruptcy. It goes at it's own pace". 

The Diamondbacks, Rockies and Padres games are being broadcast by MLB. 

The Twins sold exclusive rights to a company in bankruptcy proceedings THIS OFF SEASON. 

MLB may not be able to fix this and therefore the Twins may not be able to fix this. However... it isn't lost on me that the Twins signed the agreement to a company in bankruptcy proceedings and an expiring contract with the primary carriage.  

 

And based on St. Peter's erroneous claim that blackouts will end, it tells me the Twins were planning on going the MLB TV route too but at the last second Joe Pohlad decided he wanted the bigger bag of money instead.

[Riverbrian]

11 minutes ago, tarheeltwinsfan said:

Can you just buy an MLB.com account?

I can buy an MLB.com account. 

And it would work great if I want to watch the other 29 teams. However, I won't be able to watch the Twins on it because it will be blacked out in Twins Territory.  

[Original_JB]

For whatever reason I'm suddenly reminded of the days of people selling "black box", roof mounted DIY receivers to pirate the new (at the time) HBO signal being broadcast from the top of the IDS building; and the supposed vans that were scouring the cities detecting who was obtaining the signal illegally, threatening monster sized lawsuits similar to the music piracy ones of the '00's. (not trying to highjack, but providing like content while we wait for some sort of movement on the broadcast front)

[Major League Ready]

31 minutes ago, wabene said:

I'm not looking for a freebie and definitely not asking the Pohlads to run the Twins as a non-profit hobby. I would like them to competently run the team. Choosing short term cash from a dubious and sinking business over an option that would bring their product to a wider audience seems like it could cause long term problems for their bottom line. The way people consume media has/is changing. Baseball's fan base is ageing and shrinking. This is a crucial juncture for the Pohlads and it looks from here that they have handled it about as poorly as imaginable.

How much information do you suppose we have.  I am pretty sure we don't have a lot of the information necessary to make a business decision or critique one.  We have no idea what's going on behinds the scenes.  We don't know what is being planned or what MLB has asked of the twins.  We don't know what options were available, the economics of the alternatives or how the contractual / legal issues influenced the decision.  We don't know a lot yet assume we know how to run their business better than they do.  What if the team or league has a great long-term solution but that solution required a development period that made a current year solution infeasible?  

[Original_JB]

8 minutes ago, Major League Ready said:

 What if the team or league has a great long-term solution but that solution required a development period that made a current year solution infeasible?  

Either way they could have chosen to let MLB broadcast them instead of Bally's as they are for other teams, but they went for the (if we think we know the numbers) higher, yet riskier payoff for this year, which I could roll with, if the plan was to utilize those extra dollars on players, but they didn't even do that.

[Brock Beauchamp]

On 5/29/2024 at 8:06 AM, Original_JB said:

Riverbrian, I feel your pain. The wife and I have already modified our Happy Hour/evenings locales based on who does or doesn't carry the games. At least in here in the Twin Cities some establishments* are "working" the strife/turmoil:

* Please remove if disallowed. I do not work for Pub42, it's just one of the local establishments in my area I frequent from time to time.

By the way, we encourage people to share stuff like this whenever they come across it. We also allow self-promotion when it's relevant.

If it's interesting to Twins fans in pretty much any capacity, it's worth a share on TD.

[Riverbrian]

4 minutes ago, nicksaviking said:

And based on St. Peter's erroneous claim that blackouts will end, it tells me the Twins were planning on going the MLB TV route too but at the last second Joe Pohlad decided he wanted the bigger bag of money instead.

Whatever happened in the offices of 1 Twins way... I can't be sure. Regardless of what happened in those meetings and regardless of whose voice led the way to the current location. I have no problem pointing the finger at Joe Pohlad since he is in charge of the operation. Was it an MLB Directive? Was it a short term money grab? Was it because they ran out of time to get the real plan together? I don't know but I care and Joe is in charge.  

Right now... PR/Legal is obviously telling them to stay silent on the subject because they have been silent on the subject. Crickets in the background silent. 

I have seen no comments from those who should be commenting on behalf of the Twins organization. I know we will eat alive any comments thrown out there but if there was ever a time to stand and speak... this would be that time.    

 

 

[Major League Ready]

3 minutes ago, Original_JB said:

Either way they could have chosen to let MLB broadcast them instead of Bally's as they are for other teams, but they went for the (if we think we know the numbers) higher, yet riskier payoff for this year, which I could roll with, if the plan was to utilize those extra dollars on players, but they didn't even do that.

For starters, had they opted for no TV revenue, the decrease in revenue from 2023 would have been over $80M.  I know people want to ignore the BAM money but the decrease would have required an even bigger cut.     Had they required a MLB TV subscription the loss would have been $60m+ and all of the people watching through current sources would have been forced to pony up for MLB TV and they would be complaining.   

[Doctor Gast]

I've been close to quitting the Twins for different reasons but being able to vent your feelings on TD helps & encouragement from friends here has kept me from doing so. I'd hate to lose you as a TD brother & hope you venting has helped you from not losing interest in the Twins. Because you'd be missed.

[Riverbrian]

Just now, Doctor Gast said:

I've been close to quitting the Twins for different reasons but being able to vent your feelings on TD helps & encouragement from friends here. I'd hate to lose you as a TD brother & hope you venting has helped you from not losing interest in the Twins. Because you'd be missed.

I will always be a Twins fan. 

It's my level of Twins Fan that is at risk here. Granted... my level of Twins fan is pretty high in comparison so I have a long way to fall just to become an average fan.   

Before all of this... I would have picked up whatever package necessary to watch the Twins nightly.

After all of this... NOT picking up whatever package necessary to watch the Twins is quite possible. 

I guess... I've already fallen quite a distance and the Twins haven't started to inflate that giant airbag below me. They are not even talking about the airbag.  

  

   

[bean5302]

1 hour ago, tarheeltwinsfan said:

Can you just buy an MLB.com account?

 

How do you propose to fire the owner?

 

 

Joe Pohlad is not "the owner." He's also not the chairman (Jim Pohlad is). The Pohlad family, who collectively own the Twins, can re-organize who is actively involved in running the team any time.

[Whitey333]

We switched to Fubo for a one week trial.  The Twins were on everyday.  That was great.  But Fubo doesn't carry a lot of the channels we watch like all the Turner channels.  So we kept Hulu.  We switched several times to be able to watch h the Twins, Wild, etc.   But not anymore.  I'm done with that.  The Twins have been promising us for nearly 5 years they will fix it.  We still can't watch the Twins.  They obviously don't care about their fans.  They have blown it.  

[Craig Arko]

What are the chances the Twins (and other teams) have been instructed by the league office to keep mum?

[nicksaviking]

1 hour ago, Major League Ready said:

How much information do you suppose we have.  I am pretty sure we don't have a lot of the information necessary to make a business decision or critique one.  We have no idea what's going on behinds the scenes.  We don't know what is being planned or what MLB has asked of the twins.  We don't know what options were available, the economics of the alternatives or how the contractual / legal issues influenced the decision.  We don't know a lot yet assume we know how to run their business better than they do.  What if the team or league has a great long-term solution but that solution required a development period that made a current year solution infeasible?  

That would be great, but as you mention, we're talking about billionaires here and we should expect their top priority to be profit. And with billionaires, money now is infinitely more important to them than money in the future. If they can take the highest sums of money right now and the result is that the league ends up dying, they'll happily take their profits, divest their interests and reinvest in another industry.

So far the leaders of the MLB have shown zero long-term ambition to making this game sustainable for future generations. Hopefully there's some backroom game-plan, but I'm doubtful.

[Coach JT]

I had to subscribe to FUBU for 79 a month to get games. I hate this alternative but I love watching Twins games and did not want to go a summer not watching them. 

[Vanimal46]

4 minutes ago, Bigfork Twins Guy said:

If this were to occur, then I am gone.  I don't mind paying ONE streaming service for the games, but if they split all the games between say 3-4 different streaming services then IMO they will lose a ton of viewers as nobody in their right mind is going to pay for multiple viewing options (cable or streaming).

Fragmenting is working so far for the NFL even though there are more than a few complaints about it. They can get away with it because of the exclusivity of 1 game per week.

I can’t see it working out as well for baseball with 162 games. If the Twins are on a streaming service I’m not currently subscribed to, I’ll skip the game. The urgency is not the same to subscribe to Peacock for 1 Twins game on a random night in June. 

[DJL44]

14 minutes ago, Bigfork Twins Guy said:

If this were to occur, then I am gone.  I don't mind paying ONE streaming service for the games, but if they split all the games between say 3-4 different streaming services then IMO they will lose a ton of viewers as nobody in their right mind is going to pay for multiple viewing options (cable or streaming).

The ratio is likely to be 140-150 games on one service and 12-22 games split between other services (probably Yankees, Red Sox or Dodgers games). I can't possibly watch every regular season game so skipping a few is not a big deal.

The more annoying problem will be the continued fragmentation of the playoffs. The service you subscribe to for most regular season Twins games is probably going to be different than the services carrying the MLB playoffs. They're also going to continue to switch providers between playoff rounds. Best case scenario is one streamer gets the NL playoffs, another gets the AL playoffs and a third gets the World Series but it might end up more fragmented than that where every streaming service gets a different playoff round.

[Linus]

2 hours ago, nicksaviking said:

That would be great, but as you mention, we're talking about billionaires here and we should expect their top priority to be profit. And with billionaires, money now is infinitely more important to them than money in the future. If they can take the highest sums of money right now and the result is that the league ends up dying, they'll happily take their profits, divest their interests and reinvest in another industry.

So far the leaders of the MLB have shown zero long-term ambition to making this game sustainable for future generations. Hopefully there's some backroom game-plan, but I'm doubtful.

Preach. This whole deal reminds of Michael Milikan and the junk bond scam 

[nicksaviking]

38 minutes ago, Vanimal46 said:

Fragmenting is working so far for the NFL even though there are more than a few complaints about it. They can get away with it because of the exclusivity of 1 game per week.

I can’t see it working out as well for baseball with 162 games. If the Twins are on a streaming service I’m not currently subscribed to, I’ll skip the game. The urgency is not the same to subscribe to Peacock for 1 Twins game on a random night in June. 

And for the NFL, 95% of their games are still on the broadcast channels and 5% are on the big streamers lots of folks already have. 

If MLB tries that approach with these 3rd tier streamers that nobody would ever subscribe to except to watch this ONE thing, they're doomed.

[USAFChief]

1 hour ago, DJL44 said:

The ratio is likely to be 140-150 games on one service and 12-22 games split between other services (probably Yankees, Red Sox or Dodgers games). I can't possibly watch every regular season game so skipping a few is not a big deal.

 

It might not be a big deal to YOU.

I guarantee you it's a big deal to me.

I already pay for mlb.tv.

I don't want to pay for more streaming. 

 

[Riverbrian]

3 hours ago, Craig Arko said:

What are the chances the Twins (and other teams) have been instructed by the league office to keep mum?

 

[DJL44]

19 minutes ago, USAFChief said:

It might not be a big deal to YOU.

I guarantee you it's a big deal to me.

I already pay for mlb.tv.

I don't want to pay for more streaming. 

Nobody is going to force you to pay for more streaming than you want. You'll just miss a few Twins games. Exclusively distributed games make money. They're not going away.

[CRF]

Don't get me wrong...I love the Twins and I sympathize what people are going thru who can't get the games. For now, I can...but you know what? They're kind of hard to watch at times, even when you CAN watch them! Lets hope this thing gets resolved so we can all figure out what we're going to do. 

[bean5302]

2 hours ago, DJL44 said:

...Exclusively distributed games make money...

That's really the point. They are expected to make money, but partners like Bally Sports did not make money. There reaches a point at which nobody watches. If nobody watches, the advertisers don't buy spots and the networks don't make money. There's a possibility at least worth considering the level of fragmentation results in a revenue collapse. I don't think it's a problem for 10 or 20 games or something, though.

[Major League Ready]

9 hours ago, nicksaviking said:

That would be great, but as you mention, we're talking about billionaires here and we should expect their top priority to be profit. And with billionaires, money now is infinitely more important to them than money in the future. If they can take the highest sums of money right now and the result is that the league ends up dying, they'll happily take their profits, divest their interests and reinvest in another industry.

So far the leaders of the MLB have shown zero long-term ambition to making this game sustainable for future generations. Hopefully there's some backroom game-plan, but I'm doubtful.

What are you thinking is behind all the rule changes if not sustaining the sport?

I have worked with many very large corporations assessing various forms or organizational change and investment.  Most of them emphasize return on investment over the course of an asset life or sustainable profitability.  I suppose billionaires could be different than corporations but (just my opinion) I think perception is far different than reality in this case.   Greed is best served by maximizing ROI and short-term thinking does not facilitate ROI.

[Joe S]

https://uzzu.tv/

i paid $129.99 for full access to ALL MLB NFL NBA & NHL ….. for TWELVE MONTHS !!!! AND IT WORKS GREAT !!!!

[nicksaviking]

13 hours ago, Major League Ready said:

What are you thinking is behind all the rule changes if not sustaining the sport?

I have worked with many very large corporations assessing various forms or organizational change and investment.  Most of them emphasize return on investment over the course of an asset life or sustainable profitability.  I suppose billionaires could be different than corporations but (just my opinion) I think perception is far different than reality in this case.   Greed is best served by maximizing ROI and short-term thinking does not facilitate ROI.

Rule changes are free or of minimal cost. So far I haven't seen them willingly make any changes to endure the game that requires them to sacrifice short term dividends.

Billionaires are obviously different than corporations. Corporations are loyal to the company; they are the company. It's why the (barf) Green Bay Packers are the only sports team that will never threaten relocation or contraction.

Billionaires have multiple companies and investments that they can buy and sell as they please. They can still be loyal to one of their companies, but they can divest whenever they want, so their long term ROI goals have to do with all the parts of their portfolios, not one individual investment. For them, their best long term ROI may very well be to take the short term cash from MLB now and put it in the investment of the future. What is that investment? One Word: Plastics.

[bean5302]

On 5/30/2024 at 8:23 PM, Major League Ready said:

...I have worked with many very large corporations assessing various forms or organizational change and investment.  Most of them emphasize return on investment over the course of an asset life or sustainable profitability...

 

On 5/31/2024 at 9:35 AM, nicksaviking said:

...Billionaires are obviously different than corporations....

Billionaires are basically corporations for this conversation as owners operating "hands on" with MLB franchises is rare as it's not their typical expertise and MLB franchises are major companies on their own. Long term ROI (beyond 10 years) isn't the primary interest of a typical large corporation (absolutely any publicly held corporation) operating in recent history.

Major corporations look at the following items: Current year earnings, 3 year earnings, 5 year earnings, 10 year earnings, 20/lifespan earnings for products/departments. Significant losses in the current year are extremely unfavorable (I cannot emphasize this enough), but they can in some circumstances be offset by the promise of enormous revenues which might help shore up underperforming branches of the company or ensure the company's viability in the next few years. It's a balance. 3 year is meh, 5 year is very important and 10 year is critical. Basically, executives will absolutely not accept losses in 3 or 5 years time. Beyond 10 years is nice and all that, but the executives won't be at the company anymore by that point so they don't care much. It's just about having some semblance of fiscal responsibility. The reason 5 and 10 years are so important is what's when a lot of executives will be planning on leaving the company, and they want that company stock to be valuable when they check out.

I should note, baseball franchises operate a little differently, but the guidelines "billionaires" set for operating major corporations like the Minnesota Twins are going to be based on the owner's knowledge in running businesses. Losses for more than a year or two are just not going to happen unless the owner is chasing a dream before death (Padres recently, Tigers a decade ago, Athletics in the early 90s)

[Vanimal46]

These 2 entities were never going to work something out. Excellent business decision, Dave St Peter and the Pohlads!